Budding archers called to enter African Archery Youth Championships

Demonstrating the strength of Namibian archery at club level, at a competition hosted by Sparta Archery Club in Walvis Bay late in December, more than twenty archers competed in the various categories.

The Archery Association of Namibia and the Local Organising Committee are inviting aspiring young archers to take part in the African Archery Championships. The championships will take place from 11 to 17 April 2014 here in Windhoek. The DTS sports grounds in Olympia will play host to archers from around Africa who will take on each other in the hope of being crowned the best on the continent. The African Archery Youth Championships is the highest level of competition for the continent’s young archers and serves as a gateway towards competing in the Youth Olympics for participants who will take part in the recurve shooting events according to Proactive, the Marketing and Public Relations representatives.Namibia was given the right to host the event by the Federation of African Archery. Invitations have already been extended to Algeria, Benin, Cameroon, Gabon, Ghana, The Central African Republic, South Africa, Togo and Uganda, among other countries.

The preliminary deadline for entries is 20 January 2014.Meanwhile, Henk van der Berg and Ilana Malan won the men’s and women’s compound category respectively at the last archery tournament of 2013 which was held at the Sparta Archery Club in Walvis Bay late in December.A total of 20 archers participated at the event at the coast which was marked by strong winds. 72 arrows (max of 720 points) had to be shot during the qualification round over various distances according to the age category. Participants then moved on to the elimination round where they were ranked according to the points accumulated during the qualification round. Unfortunately, some categories didn’t move to the elimination round due to a lack of participants. Winners in these categories were determined after the qualification round only.During the qualification round, Ruan van Staden cruised to first place with an impressive 666 points. Second place went to Sebastian Fechter (659), while Henk van der Berg came in third (658).Van Staden was then unable to take his run of form to the final of the elimination round where he eventually lost to van der Berg. It was a closely contested final. With a maximum of 150 points up for grabs, van der Berg helped himself to 138 points, while van Staden had to settle for 136 points.In the women’s category, Ilana Malan romped to victory in dominating fashion. She acquired 632 points. Connie Smit and Bea Viviers couldn’t match Malan’s form and had to share second place with 615 points each.Andre’ van der Merwe came out victorious in the compound junior men category. This category was made up of shooters from different age categories because of a lack of participants. Second place went to Warren Smit while Johan van der Merwe came in third.Another highlight of the day was young Quinn Redding shooting 660 points in the U15 girl’s category elimination round. Although her target was only placed 20 meters away, her accumulated points speak volumes about her class and she is definitely an archer to watch out for in the future. Redding then went on to win the final of the compound U13 category elimination shoot-out against her only rival Maarten van der Merwe.